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Colonel Pyatkov

Published: 13.04.2018

Having made an excellent military career, Mikhail Pyatkov has succeeded in civilian life as well. 15 years before retirement, to be exact up to his 75 years, he was in charge of the HR service at USUE-SINH.

Mikhail Pyatkov can be called a man of an unusual fate. A hard life test for him was the death of his mother. When the misfortune happened, Misha was only six months old. A childless couple adopted him and brought to Dalnyaya Zakora village in Irkutsk Oblast. His stepfather was engaged in farming, and his stepmother was a homemaker.

When the Great Patriotic War began, Mikhail was 12 years old. Already in July, he and his peers worked for brickworks because all the factory men left for the front. Then women and old men replaced them.

Until October 1, before school classes began, the teens worked on reaping and harvesting of potatoes and vegetables.

During military exercises in Buryatia. Early 1970's.

In June 1942, Mikhail Pyatkov graduated from a seven-year school and began his hard-working life, which will last as long as 62 years.

After the graduation, he began to work together with his father at "Zagotskot”. In summer, Mikhail tended cattle and in winter, along with his partner, every day went 10-12 kilometers away to bring hay. In spring, the boys became the main plowmen: they plowed and sowed all the fields given to them. After the sowing, haymaking came, followed by harvesting. In addition, they were responsible for grooming horses.

"It was a hard time: we worked for a bread ration and survived only thanks to our orchard garden," Mikhail Pyatkov recalls.

In January 1944, Mikhail went to work as a dispatcher at Zolotoprodnab agency: he registered cars with cargo arrived from Kachug. The cars transported flour and other products that were stored, and in spring and summer, sent by barges to gold mines, located on rivers of Irkutsk Oblast and Yakutia. In March 1944, being a fifteen-year-old boy he was appointed the manager of this base.

In August 1948, Mikhail was called up for military service and sent to study at the Omsk M.V. Frunze Red Banner Military School. After graduation from that school, he served in the group of Soviet troops in Germany as commander of a machine-gun platoon, secretary of the Komsomol organization of a driving school, assistant to the chief of political department for Komsomol work at the 9^th Guards Tank Division. Later, he had the same post in the 40^th Guards Division of the 11th Guards Army of the Baltic Military District.

In 1959, Mikhail Pyatkov entered the Military-Political Academy named after V.I. Lenin. After graduation from the Academy, he served as a political worker in Baltic, Transbaikal, and Ural military districts. In 1974, he was promoted to the rank of colonel.

The assigned political department. Mikhail Pyatkov is third from left. Buryatia, Kyakhta.

For 32 years in the Soviet Army, he has government awards: Order For Service to the Homeland in the Armed Forces of the USSR, 3rd class, 14 medals of the USSR and 5 medals of the socialist countries. For his work in the war years, he was awarded the medal "For Valorous Labor in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945."

After retiring from the Armed Forces, Mikhail Pyatkov worked for seven years as the head of the HR department at the Mining Institute. In January 1987, he was invited to the post of the head of the personnel department of the Sverdlovsk Institute of National ¬ Economy (SINH). Later on, in 1994, the institute received the status of Ural State University of Economics. Mikhail Konstantinovich performed his functional duties with high responsibility, carefully planned and under the guidance of the USUE Rector he organized the certification of the University staff, timely and qualitatively prepared competitive selections and elections of faculty members.

Instruction of tank crews before underwater driving of tanks. From left to right: Battalion commander, Hero of the Soviet Union Ivan Patrushev and political commissar Mikhail Pyatkov.

His high qualification and considerable practical experience of working with people allowed him, while 15 years in the capacity of the head of the HR service, not to have any litigation and complaints concerning observance of employment legislation at the University. As an experienced specialist, Mikhail Pyatkov, in accordance with the decision of the Council of Rectors of Yekaterinburg universities, led a seminar for heads of the HR departments of Yekaterinburg higher educational institutions.

Pyatkov (right) with generals during the field inspection.

Mikhail Konstantinovich has a big family. His son Vyacheslav followed in his footsteps and became a military man. His family lives in Kaliningrad. His daughter Galina was the principal of school №69, and now she works at the department of education of Verkh-Isetsky district. His son-in-law Yevgeny Maksymchuk , reserve lieutenant colonel, also worked for USUE, at its Military Arts Division.

Mikhail Pyatkov has a granddaughter and three grandsons, and, all three has graduated from Ural State University of Economics. In Kaliningrad, the first great-granddaughter grows up; she is only three years old.

Now Mikhail Konstantinovich is 90 years old. Despite his age, he is still vigorous, physically strong, and feels positive about the life.

The secret of his longevity is in regular cold training and active lifestyle. Since the early years, he regularly did morning exercises. Being a cadet, he used cold rubdowns in the morning. Throughout his life, he is an adventurous and rugged outdoorsman. In his home area, in Transbaikalia, there are excellent hunting places. There he went hunting a Far Eastern red deer, and in the Urals, he hunted 6 moose.

"As soon as I left work in 2003, I go fishing every season. I started with my friends who are long-dead, but one of them lived 90 years and another lived 102 years. I fully agree with the saying: "The time spent on fishing sustains life." One day, I calculated: Being retired, I spent fishing three years full!" Mikhail Konstantinovich shares. Is this not a motivation for a useful pastime in the open air, away from everyday worries?

Like any angler, he has his own fishing achievements. The biggest catch was 12 kg. Once in Transbaikalia, on the river Selenga, he caught a taimen about two meters in size and weighing 16 kg.

Mikhail Konstantinovich has enough energy for public affairs: he visits important events at USUE and meets with students. This March, he participated in the opening of the sculpture "Russia" personifying a woman - defender of Motherland. Addressing the youth, the veteran said, "You must make Russia always flourish and make everyone know that there is a country in the world that is unattainable in its power to anyone." Mikhail Pyatkov spent his whole life properly coping with this task, moved and continues to move forward through thick and thin.